In the Heat of the Night: Channel Technology drives Innovation Cycles at Madgex

The job board market is extremely competitive and job board owners are increasingly looking for innovative solutions that will give them the edge over their competition.Madgex, Brighton-based developer of innovative Software packages for job board, is concerned day and night how to keep up with the latest changes in technologies and recruiting markets to stay ahead. Alastair Digby, Sales and Marketing Manager at Madgex, explains how this is done.

 

What percentage of your IT-technology investment is allocated to enhance Madgex Software Search functionality?

At Madgex we have a dedicated product roadmap which ensures that we add new features and functionality to our technology every 3 weeks. A major part of this development is focused on improvements to search functionality. This spans various aspects such as using analytics data to research user journeys, in-depth A/B testing for different search user journeys and using feedback from our clients. Overall we spend 10% of our product development solely on improvements to search. As users become more sophisticated in their search behaviour it is of paramount importance to ensure we provide a coherent and relevant search experience for all users.

How Madgex resolves the three greatest challenges in job board search technology?

Over the last 12 months Tracy Godding, our Head of User Experience, has been conducting an extensive research project into search. The findings identified 3 key areas for improvements; creating a linear and singular search journey, provide intelligent, fast and intuitive search results and making search results more personalised & relevant.

 

We have seen a shift in search behaviour moving away from searching for a specific job title to searching based on keywords and skills. For example if you use the keyword for skill ‚User Experience‘ it would be useful to see a list of job titles to choose from such as Head of User Experience, User Experience Consultant, User Experience Designer, Senior User Experience Consultant etc. This makes it far easier for the job seeker to find roles that match their skills and experience which will help increase application rates.

 

The majority of search begins on the homepage of a job board so there is an opportunity to add filters to speed up the search experience. This could include filter buttons to view all jobs, recently added jobs and jobs close to expiring. This provides the user quick access to specific types of jobs as the initial starting point for their search. From here the search can be further refined by using faceted navigation to narrow the search to any number of criteria such as location, salary band, job title and so on.

 

We collect data about users, both from their profile and also on their search behaviour. There is an opportunity to provide a deeper level of personalisation and therefore provide a richer and more individual search experience on our job boards. By harnessing this data more effectively we can display results based on the history and search patterns of an individual. This would mean that when a user returns to the job board the search and results would be tailored to them based on their previous interactions with the job board.

 

Simple search box (‚Google style‘) or enhanced search features – what works best for job seekers?

Although adopting a Google style search feature is becoming increasingly popular it is worth bearing in mind that you still need to offer an enhanced search feature as well. Most job seekers will have a preferred method of how they like to search your job board. The majority may well prefer the Google style search however some will still opt to use enhanced search. The key is to make both search options easily accessible to job seekers so they don’t have to waste to find the option they want to use. In order to provide the best possible user experience include both search options.

 

About Madgex

Madgex provides world class job board software services to the global market. Over the last 12 years we have gained extensive experience in building job boards that meet the demands of the ever-changing digital recruitment landscape.

Our award-winning innovative job board software is designed to help drive digital recruitment revenues for leading clients including; The Guardian, The Washington Post, The Daily Telegraph, New England Journal of Medicine, Emap, Incisive Media, IDG, NHST Media, Job2Sea, The Star Tribune, RBI, Wiley and many more.

We focus heavily on innovation, design and user experience constantly adding more features, functionality and language capabilities to our job board platform. This enables our clients to configure and localize their job board to their individual markets in multiple languages. By bringing together cutting edge software, market insight and an extensive knowledge of what works, we help ensure that all our clients achieve the best possible results from their job board business.

Specialties

Job Board Software, User Experience, CV Database, Mobile Apps, Job Board Design, Search Engine Optimisation, CV Search & Matching, Resume Search Software, Classified Job Software, Online Recruiting Software, Job Scraping & Wrapping, Niche Job Boards

• Headquarters

  One Gloucester Place Brighton, East Sussex BN1 4AA United Kingdom

• Website

  http://www.madgex.com

• Industry

  Internet

• Type

  Privately Held

• Company Size

  51-200 employees

• Founded

  2000